HUNTSVILLE, Alabama - The way beer snobs gaze at the Great Wall of Taps inside Liquor Express you would think there are heralding cherubs buzzing around it.

Sadly, there’s only a mounted rhino’s head – not poached, of course – above the ingenious and crafty design that dispenses 40 beers, ranging from local brews to breweries based in Maryland and Oregon. Simply put, it’s paradise for brew connoisseurs, especially with close to 600 different beers to choose from – you can mix and match to create either a four-pack or six-pack using the 160 single beers in the coolers.

But if you were to walk in Liquor Express seven months ago, it could easily have been compared to a regular, run-of-the-mill liquor store with maybe 100 beer varieties of domestics and others, manager Chris Grimes said.

“When the laws changed to have a higher beer gravity, we decided to take over and be the place to come and get beer,” he said. “If we don’t have it, you can’t get it.”

Since many microbreweries don’t bottle their brew and most folks don’t have Kegerators stashed next to the dishwasher in their kitchens, selling half gallons and gallons of craft beer on tap is rather a brilliant concept. Prices per half-gallon and gallon vary according to how much Liquor Express pays for each keg. It ranges from $7.89 for a half gallon to $39.99 for a gallon depending on the selected beer. Some gallons, Grimes said, cost $65.

“We are the first ones to do this in 10 years successfully,” Grimes said. “It took us four to five months to get the OK for the wall of taps and get it all taken care of.

“When we first started, we had 24 taps and I thought that would be hard to fill,” he said. “But now I need more taps because so many people want more beer on tap.”

Try the Nook

If you are searching for a local establishment that redefines the typical bar model – no smoking, not serving domestic beers, not calling it a bar, being clean and allowing sunlight – then give the Nook Tavern on Bob Wallace Avenue a try.

When retired nuclear engineer Connell Allen reopened his version of the Nook on April 1, 2007, there were only two beers on tap – Guiness and Harp. Four years later, the Nook has earned a reputation of serving more than 370 beers costing $4 to $24 – Italy’s Birrificio Troll’s Geisha is the most expensive – and 48 beers on tap.

“Everything we do is the opposite of every other place and not only in this town, essentially in this business,” Allen said. “We take a different approach with everything.”

Upon entering the Nook, you will find six sheets of paper, including items on the menu, on top of the tables and bar that group all 370 plus beers into 27 sections, such as local brews, Belgian Lambics, pale lagers, various organic styles and even fruit and vegetable beer, among others.

“It’s not a matter of having a lot of beers,” Allen said. “It’s unusual and we are more focused on what we consider more upscale beers.

“We don’t even carry Bud, Miller, Coors, Corona, Heineken or any of those guys,” he said. “Our customers won’t even buy them, that’s the irony of it.”